Ashes to Asses
by livengoo
Summary: The boys may make Hunter History when they discover a new kind of haunting. Sam is thrilled. Dean . . . not so much.Rated T just because it's gross and hey, most kids know the words but shouldn't be encouraged to use 'em.


Ashes to Asses A Supernatural Fic By livengoo

livengoo at tiac at net

Sam, Dean and the Impala, of course, belong to McG.

Based on a true story and a few halfway true stories. For any research nerds out there, check out / horrors / cannibal / cocaine.htm. That one never gets old . . .

1) Flours for the Dead

Two brothers stood in the thundering silence that, moments before, had been been the cacophony of a haunting in full swing. Their ears still rang. The older brother, Dean, was tall, well built, pale with dark blonde hair and hazel-green eyes. His brother was even taller, rangy and wide shouldered, dark haired and dark eyed. Not that anyone could have told that about either one, because at that moment, Dean Winchester was white as a ghost. So was his brother, Sam. The two of them looked at each other and the planets must have been in alignment because both of them sneezed at the same instant, sending clouds of flour puffing into the air to catch sunbeams in the murky atmosphere of the kitchen.

"Goddamn it I do not BELIEVE this!" The elder Winchester groaned, running a hand through his hair and accomplishing very little other than to cloud the air more.

"We got off lucky," sighed Sam. He scuffed over to the sink, trying to keep from stepping on the spoiled food on the floor. "No blood at all."

"Are you out of your mind? You call this lucky? Do you know how long it'll take to get this crap out of my jacket? God, I'm gonna have white seams on black leather . . ."

Sam snickered and turned the water on fast to cover the sound. "Could have been worse."

"How? I think I'd rather have her throw things at me instead of this! Goddamn Caspar doesn't know how to do the job right. You hear that?" He was suddenly shouting at the ceiling. "You're a POLTERGEIST, bitch! You're supposed to try to kill me, not bake me cookies! Especially not BAD ones! Not cool, Essie, not a cool weapon at all!"

Sam, rinsing the flour off his face, couldn't help snorting a handful of floury water up his nose, like sucking up thin library paste. He choked and bent over the sink, laughing. "Come on, Dean. She's a nice old lady. She was making us snacks!"

"Yeah, laugh it up. You're not the one who slipped on a moldy cupcake and shot the living room lamp. Rock salt might not kill ya but it does a real number on the furniture."

Sam looked up and took in his brother, coated head to toe in extra-fine cake flour, and had to bite down on his lips to keep from braying at the sight. "White's not your color, man."

"Cute. You look like . . ." Dean trailed off, waving helplessly towards him and finally shook his head. "I don't know, but it sure ain't right."

"Come on. Let's get out of here before she starts baking again."

Dean shot a nervous look at the stove and nodded. "Oh yeah, cause, stray spark, flour . . .not pretty."

"There are times I'm amazed at the things you know," Sam observed, wiping water from his face. Hair and clothes would wait for the motel.

"Hey, flour explodes. I know a lot about things that explode."

"Yeahhh . . . that explains so much." Sam sighed and tossed a damp paper towel to him. "You're gonna be detailing the car for a week."

"No, YOU are going to be detailing the car for a week."

"Me?" Sam said as he kicked aside a year's worth of rock-hard, stale breads, cookies, and muffins to get to the cabinets. "I'm not the one who dared her to do her worst."

"You're just the one who found this crazy ghost to start with. I mean, haunted kitchen?"

Sam shrugged. "It's been a year since anyone could live here. Haunted enough."

Dean, human-colored face framed by spiky, flour-dusted hair and clothes, wandered idly around the kitchen, checking counters, flowerpots of dead plants, freezer, and lower cabinets. Sam pointedly looked DOWN at him as he reached up to get one of the upper cabinets. Dean made a face in return. "When are people gonna learn to just burn 'em and urn 'em?"

"That is -" Sam wrinkled his nose and sneezed at the dusty, musty air. "Really bad. And if we just respected the wishes of the dead you know as well as me that burial's not a problem."

"Yeah, right. If they'd burned Gus they wouldn't have a problem."

"If they'd buried Essie's ashes next to him like they both wanted it wouldn't be a problem either. And for that matter, they DID 'burn and urn' her, as you so delicately put it."

Dean grinned, teeth as white as the flour, and shook his head. "Only works if they're not clinging to anything else, college boy. You know that."

Sam looked around him and nodded. This ghost had certainly been clinging to something else. While her elderly husband had been alive, she'd been fine. Better than fine – Gus's niece had commented on "his" baking hobby and how he'd always had cookies or snacks for any grandchildren or cousins who happened to drop by. It only when he dropped dead of a well-earned, cake-fueled heart attack that anyone considered that maybe Gus didn't have such a golden touch in the kitchen. And after he died, well . . . that golden touch went to hell. Everyone might love chocolate chip cookies but not fired like skeets from the toaster. The booby-trapped jelly roll pitfalls led to a few twisted ankles and sprains before each of three buyers gave up and ran for safer housing where baked goods didn't lie in wait.

"Ahhh, of course." Dean had an arm wrapped around a large, ceramic pot shaped like Winnie the Pooh, and he was smiling gleefully as he reached inside and pulled out a plain, cardboard box. "Where else would you keep a woman like Essie but the cookie jar?"

"You are kidding me."

"Nope." He pulled the box out the rest of the way.

"You could just leave it in the jar," suggested Sam.

"And be caught in public with the thing?" Dean tucked the box under his arm and made a rude noise. "I don't think so."

And that was how it started.

2) Dead and Gone

They should have known better. They really should.

It was a bad area of town. But it was a hot day and it was Florida, and leaving the windows down just seemed like the way to go. Dean was humming, drumming on the steering wheel, relaxed and happy and listening to Blue Oyster Cult at a volume loud enough to drown out every rap boombox in a three block radius. Sam couldn't bring himself to find fault with that – bad as the metal could get, rap had never been his thing. Essie's ashes sat serenely between them and not a baked good in sight. Somehow, she seemed to know she was on the way to be reunited with her Gus, and all was well in the life and afterlife of everyone in the Impala.

Which is where it would have stayed if they hadn't hit that red light.

Dean saw it first. Sam would have been annoyed, or mortified, if he hadn't been so damn scared that Dean would try something and get himself, or both of them, shot. It wasn't an empty threat. The first guy had come up on Sam's side fast. From the corner of his eye he saw Dean's head turn, knew he'd seen the movement, and knowing Dean also knew his hand was flashing towards his back since Dean might leave home without his American Express but he never did without his Glock. That was when the guy who'd been threatening to squeegee the windows was suddenly threatening them with something much worse. The click of a cocking handgun was loud enough to make both brothers freeze where they were, Dean with his hand half way behind him and Sam, looking out the windshield, where he could keep both gunmen in his peripheral vision.

"Hands on the wheel." The voice was accented and deadly serious. Sam breathed a sigh of relief as Dean pulled his right hand back out from under the loose over-shirt he wore to disguise exactly what he was reaching for, the gun at his back. On the passenger side the other gunman was pulling the door open waving his gun. Sam didn't hesitate. No car was worth it. Not even the Impala.

Dean took a moment longer and earned a quick smack to the face that left him with a split lip and the imprint of a Saturday Night Special across his cheek but he made the right decision too and scrambled out into the sunlit street of the corner, where pedestrians were carefully avoiding noticing what was going on and the only real attention they'd drawn was from a few cars honking at them for keeping them from going through the now-green light.

Sam had stepped back between two parked sedans and was watching Dean, who stood in the middle of the street between the two lanes of traffic, cursing and waiting for the next red light. "Goddamn thoughtless vicious hostile motherfucking cocksucking SON of a BITCH!" There was a certain practiced rhythm to the oath and he briefly wondered how many times Dean had used it. And then he wondered if the carjackers would pop the trunk and where the HELL were they going to sell off the parts of a 1967 Impala anyway . . .

A break in the traffic let his brother, still cursing, stalk over to join him. "Well. FUCK!"

"Yep. That about sums it up."

"Is that ALL you have to say, Sam?"

Not Sammy. Huh. Must be REALLY pissed off.

"What? I'm devastated here, suffering loss and . . . deprivation, yeah . . ."

"Loss of consortium?"

"You totally suck."

Sam slapped him on the back and got a good handful of shirt, pulling Dean into motion. "Come on. We won't get a cab in this neighborhood."

"As if we'd know what to DO with a cab. Besides steal it and make for the state line before the cops find us. Hey . . ." Dean stood on his tip toes and looked down the Miami city blocks where the Impala was jack-rabbiting from stop light to stop light, in sight but not in reach. "Huh. Maybe if I shot out the windshield."

Sam gave his shirt another jerk, pulling him off balance and into motion again. "You are not shooting at a car on a crowded street in broad daylight."

"Which part of that is most important? Crowded, daylight, or the Impala?"

"For me, it's the crowded part. But I know you'd never recover from shooting at your baby." Sam slouched along, relieved that at least he was successfully distracting Dean.

His brother heaved a long, bitter, broken-hearted sigh. "Maybe. Will I ever see her again?"

"How many chop shops do you know that specialize in 39 year old cars?"

"My baby's a classic!"

"Your baby has more mileage than the space shuttle on her. If it were a Mercedes or a Honda, I'd say kiss it goodbye, Dean. But as it is, cheer up! I bet we see her again before long. I'm just hoping the cops don't see her first."

Dean had brightened, then shifted straight into a weird hybrid of cocky and worried. "Yeah. Cops. But as long as she's okay. . . ."

"The Impala will be . . ." Sam trailed off and frowned. He shaded his eyes and looked down the street a block, two. "Huh. That's interesting."

"What?" Dean glanced at him, then flinched as a distant backfire echoed down the blocks. "Oh crap! What's happening? What are they doing to my car?"

Sam glanced over at him, then back down the street, and realized he was only just barely seeing the top of the Impala over the parked cars – a top that was lurching and popping up and down as backfires racketed down the block. All that and Dean, four inches shorter, was just not . . .quite . . .tall enough to see it. Dean was jumping up and down now, prairie dogging, trying to put together enough little images to figure out what was happening even as he started to jog forward and Sam was only just able to bite down on the inside of his mouth long enough to keep from laughing at his brother. Good thing too – Dean liked his revenge served cold.

They'd gotten a block and now Dean was picking up speed, racing towards his beloved car but they were still more than a city block away when the doors slammed open, sending a bicycle messenger flying, and their carjackers spilled out screaming and flailing their arms. Howling, they abandoned their prize and raced off into the trash-strewn alleys. By the time the Winchester brothers reached their car, their attackers were nowhere to be found and the only evidence of the Impala's brief capture was the rough-idling engine and the odd sense both young men had that something was missing.

Dean slid behind the wheel with an audible sigh of relief and patted the chrome and enamel medallion in the center. "It's okay, baby, daddy's home."

Sam rolled his eyes, but couldn't fault the sentiment. The seat felt welcoming and familiar to his butt and he nearly patted the dashboard himself. Both of them slammed their doors in tandem and suddenly the engine, which had been pinging and knocking and generally making every noise a car should never make, smoothed out. Dropped to the low, even growl of a happy car. Sam blinked. Looked over to meet Dean's eyes only to find an obnoxiously happy grin. "See? She knows me!"

"You are deranged. It's just . . . " he paused and frowned, and looked around. "Something's missing."

"Yeah," sighed Dean happily as he put it in drive and eased through a newly turned green light. "A pair of jerks."

"No, no, I don't see . . ." Sam trailed off, staring vacantly out the windshield, then rolled his eyes and groaned. "Oh, I don't believe it, they took Essie!"

"They what?" Dean glanced into the back, then down to the seat between them, then up to meet Sam's eyes. And groaned. "Tell me this doesn't mean more cookies, Sam, please."

There weren't any cookies. There also wasn't any box. They pulled over and both Winchesters searched the car, looking under seats and into the back and hoping against hope that their poltergeist's cardboard box of earthly remains had fallen on the floor or slid under some automotive structure or other, but hope was in vain.

When the car turned up empty, they locked up and returned to the corner, combing the street, checking under cars, venturing into the alleys in search of their missing parcel. They found trash and treasures. Dean turned up a lottery ticket with the blocks not scratched off – he made $5. Sam found a pair of perfectly good sneakers, though the light in the heel didn't blink anymore. They both found assorted change, declined to pick up pennies, and ignored the odd looks shot their way, but neither of them found hide, hair, lid, or crumb of the sturdy, plain, cardboard box tied up in string that had been on the front seat when their brief adventure began. They stood on opposite sides of the street in the brutally hard sun and shrugged, hands spread wide and empty.

"No luck?" Dean crossed the street like a matador warming up, dancing between cars and flipping off drivers with a theatrical flourish.

"Nope." Sam looked around, perplexed. "I don't get it. What do they think they're gonna DO with a box full of ashes?"

Dean shrugged. "You're asking me? Demons I get . . ."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, but humans make no sense. Got it."

"Pretty much, yeah. Who knows? Rituals, drive their moms nuts? I have absolutely no idea. Didn't they cover creative uses for cremains in one of those art electives you took?"

"Oh sure," Sam grumped. Then snickered. "They've got these little teddy bear doll urns now, you know? Just so cute, Dean! I figure that's what I'll do with your ashes one of these days."

Dean had come to a screeching halt and was staring at him in wide-eyed horror. "Oh hell, I've seen those ugly little teddy bear fucks. You do that and I WILL come back and haunt your ass, bitch."

"Get one custom made like a plushy little Impala toy and use it as a couch pillow –"

Dean shuddered theatrically. "I think I'm too appalled to think up a fitting revenge. I'm suddenly feeling a certain bond with Essie. Too bad she's not around anymore."

"Yeah," Sam said.

3) Dead Ugly

The room was hideous. That was a given. Sam was pretty sure that his brother had been born under a curse, kind of like a Disney cartoon princess. Well, both of them were really, but where his curse was a big, hideous, murdering demon, Dean was visited by a garish fairy who cursed him to the most horrible motel decor in any hundred square mile area.

Which explained why Dean was holding a pink flamingo to his ear and talking into its ass. "That's right, a box of ashes." There was a pause and line formed between Dean's brows. His eyes narrowed and his voice dropped and gained an edge of a growl. "No. I told you. They were in a box and the box was in my car."

That tone of voice should have been a warning to whoever was on the other side. Sam sat back from his computer to watch. A flush was rising in Dean's cheeks and the muscles in his jaw jumped. "Listen. It was a cardboard box of cremated ashes and it was in my car, and . . .I TOLD you I was carjacked! No, I did NOT report the . . ."

His voice was rising, and the hard edge was going hot. Sam raised his eyebrows in question and he really did try hard to keep his growing amusement off his face. Dean scowled and flipped him off. Sam wove his fingers behind his head and leaned back and waited.

Dean spun, put his back to Sam, then spun back. "No, I told . . .NO! NOOOO! LISTEN YOU FUCKWIT, I TOLD - owww!" He yanked the phone away from his ear.

Sam could hear the phone slam down from across the motel room. He winced in sympathy. "I take it the box didn't wind up in lost and found?"

"Remember when I told you the cops are useless?" Dean put the flamingo phone down with exaggerated care. "Well, once again I am totally right."

"Sounded like you were really busy making friends and influencing people there, big bro." Sam leaned his chair back, balancing on the back legs and smirking, then yelped as a brotherly foot pushed him back and nearly toppled him before he scrambled to his feet and let the chair take the fall. "Cute. You have rotten phone manners so you take it out on me?"

"That's what it means to be the big brother. The job comes with some perks." Dean dropped onto end of his bed and sprawled back on the fluorescent-green-and-pink comforter, rubbing at his eyes. "Ah crap. We have to start calling around again, don't we? You know, rooms like this make me really want to go out and kill something."

Sam grinned and turned back to his web searching. "Yeah, with you on that. And I need to tell you, pink and green? NOT your colors."

Dean flipped him off again. "That's what I love about you, Sam. You enrich my existence so profoundly."

"Don't blame me. I was willing to take a nice, classic motel. YOU picked this one."

"True. I can't decide which is worse. This or the traditional baby shit brown and strained carrot orange." He sighed and rolled on his side, head resting on his outstretched arm. "While I was doing battle with the rude and surly authority figures at the local cop shop, what were you doing? Find any good porn sites?"

"Have I told you you're disgusting?"

"Yep! I have a boy scout badge in disgusting."

"You were never in scouts." Sam eyed him.

"Sort of my point. So. Okay." Dean waved a hand in the air in a circle. "Our options. We could abandon her -"

"DEAN!"

"Yeah, I kind of like the old girl too. I mean, she did use chocolate chip for me and those are my favorite. So, throw a dart at the phone book?"

"Seance?"

Dean snickered. "Why not just get a ouija board? Maybe use a cookie for a planchette."

Sam had been idly scanning blogs, not really looking for anything, more just to be doing something. Jess had liked to crochet – he supposed cruising blogs was his . . . that train of thought suddenly took a turn a little too fast as he stared and blinked. Licked his lips. Shook his head. "Dude, I think maybe we can skip the séance."

Dean lifted his head from the bed. "You got something?"

"See for yourself." He spun the laptop so his brother could see the cheesy blog with its jumpy video. If he really thought about it, he was sort of glad the video was such lousy quality. He just did NOT want to see some guy oozing a river of ectoplasmic snot out his nose.

"Ew!" Dean had scrunched up his face.

"You took the word right out of my mouth!"

"Like . . . ewwww!" Dean sat up and leaned in to examine the screen more closely. "Is that what I think it is?"

"Unearthly possessed boogers?"

"How the hell . . ." Dean's eyes went wide and he looked up at Sam and he was trying, oh, visibly trying to maintain an air of professional cool. "The only explanation I can think of is . . ." He put a finger under his nose and sniffed noisily.

Sam pulled a face. "I suppose you COULD mistake cremains for drugs . . . if you really were desperate."

"Or a fucking moron!" Dean was staring at the screen with horrified fascination.

Sam opened his mouth, paused, shut it, bit down on his lips struggling to match Dean's very strained cool and noted, "I've never heard of haunted sinuses before. We might be discovering a previously unknown haunting."

"Dad sure as hell never saw this." Dean rubbed his nose in sympathy and winced at the yowls that accompanied the visuals. Or maybe at the wet, sticky noises behind them. Sam saw it when he lost it, when his brow suddenly furrowed with effort and the corners of his mouth turned down, and then he just broke out laughing and rolled onto his back. "Oh god, they snorted a ghost! It's a fucking snortergeist!"

"This is a serious matter, Dean. These poor men are being haunted by . . ." Sam waved at the screen and then couldn't keep his stone face and started to giggle. "They're being slimed from beyond the grave!"

Dean was hooting, rolling side to side, tears sliding down his red face as he laughed, "Snortergeists! Haunted snot!"

"Are we gonna have to salt and burn their Kleenex?"

"OH MY GOD!" Gasped Dean, rolling off the bed with laughter. All Sam could see was the booted feet kicking in the air. "Just say no to blow! He sliiiimed me!"

Sam had slithered down to the floor too and peered over the bed at Dean. "Lame Ghostbusters jokes is the best you can do? We're gonna go down in hunter history for discovering a whole new form of haunting and that's all you can bring?"

"-history!-" Dean squeaked. "Oh god oh god oh god can you see what Missouri would do? The LOOK on her face!"

"Wait a minute, hold on . . ." Sam plunked back down to the floor on his side. "Dean, if you were trying to plan tactics and strategy for something like this . . . a nasal poltergeist -" He had to pause and bite down on the giggles.

"-snortergeist-" came the muffled, breathless whoop from the other side of the bed.

"Yes, I heard you the first time. But how would you attack something like this?"

Dean's head suddenly popped up and while he had tear tracks on his face, he looked like he'd gone from giggles to sober in three seconds flat. He met Sam's eyes and tilted his head, gaze a bit distant. A slow look of revulsion settled on his features. "Oh. OH. That is disgusting."

"Yeah, I dunno about you but I sure as hell don't want to get up close and personal with this particular apparition."

"Huh. Wonder if we can get 'em to use a Holy water-rock salt nasal spray," Dean sounded thoughtful.

"I'm not sure if that's sacrilegious or just dumb. You'd have to get close enough to ask them to use it and then they'd have to be able to get it up their noses."

"Ecch." Dean made a face. "Kind of a problem with the eerie canal running out of their noses."

"For the record man, yuck. Just to make it official. YUCK."

"You got a better idea?"

Sam blinked. Hesitated. Shrugged. "Not really."

Dean rested his chin on the ugly, tropical jungle-pattern comforter. "Maybe this one, this time . . .I mean, it'd be a public service wouldn't it?"

Sam narrowed his eyes suspiciously. "What?"

"Maybe just let this ghost be? I mean, kids take one look at the snot monsters and I know I sure as hell wouldn't touch drugs."

"Leaving aside the fact that you're a hardcore adrenaline junky, how can you even suggest that?"

Dean shrugged. "Adrenaline is one thing. Coke is another. And snorting somebody's grandma? Totally out of the question."

"I doubt they knew. To my knowledge old ladies aren't on the designer drug list," noted Sam.

"Well, one look at these guys and, I dunno, but I sure wouldn't want to risk it. Might be a good anti-drug message. And do you REALLY want to go get messy in that?"

Sam cringed at the idea, then sighed. "Can't do it big brother. We can't ignore this."

"Why not?" Dean sat up a little straight. "It'd be a public service! Snortergeists for the greater good."

"Kids might accidentally try it?"

"Would YOU buy drugs from somebody who looked like that?" Dean pointed to laptop on the table. "Hell, would you buy drugs just knowing you COULD end up looking like that?"

"Dean. It's not just drugs. I mean, think of the harm this is doing."

"What harm?"

Sam hesitated, thought fast. "All those poor victimized janitors. And the lawsuits!"

His brother was eyeing him suspiciously. "Lawsuits? For what?"

"Slip and fall. You saw that stuff. Little old ladies falling down in stairwells, emergency crews faced with floors covered in –"

"Euuugh!" Dean shuddered. "Stop. I get the idea."

"So. We're agreed."

"Why us?" Dean flopped back down to the floor, then one hand came up over the edge of the bed to point at Sam. "Better get the Holy Water, dude. We're making nose spray."

4) Nobody Nose the Trouble I've Been

"I guess I don't need to ask if you're sure this is the place." Dean peered out past Sam and audibly swallowed. "Blecch."

"Yeahhhh." Sam swallowed hard. "I mean, it was easy to find between the architecture and the building name in the background of the vid. But . . . I guess we could have found it just driving around too."

"Oh, I dunno. The sign that says 'look out for snot monster' isn't that obvious." Dean tilted his head sharply. "Or easy to read. Don't they teach handwriting anymore?"

"They usually don't practice with spray paint at that size. I guess it's a little harder to keep your penmanship when you get over a couple feet high per letter."

"Yeah, well . . . ." Dean's hands hadn't left the Impala's wheel. His knuckles looked a bit pale. "At least we know we have the right place."

Sam eyed him. "You're stalling."

His brother glared back. "I'm not stalling. You're stalling."

Sam rolled his eyes and reached into the paper bag on his lap. "Here. I got you this."

Dean took the box. Curled a lip. "Trash bags?"

"I thought about rain ponchos. Then I thought about having my face uncovered in there."

Dean's face went pale. Sam could see his Adam's apple jolt as he swallowed hard. "Do you have to keep talking about the . . .the snot."

Sam stared at him, wide eyed. "Oh. My. God. You're grossed out."

"I am not."

A chuckle was bubbling up in Sam's chest. "You ARE! Dean, I've seen you put your fist through a zombie's head! I've seen you covered in mud and muck and decayed bodies and THIS grosses you out?"

"YES! Okay, yes, is that what you want to hear? YES! SNOT GROSSES ME OUT!"

Sam watched him wave his arms and yell and could only shake his head. "Damn. I never thought I'd see it. I've seen you eat pizza with grave dirt under your fingernails."

"Yeah, well. YOU raise a little kid and see how YOU feel about the glazed donut look." He was still looking greenish.

"But . . ." Sam was floundering, caught between wanting to laugh in his face and kind of agreeing every time he looked over and saw the puddles of greenish . . . fluid . . .on the front steps of the Metropolitan Apartments. "Dean, that's just natural."

"So is rot and decay and I know zombies aren't gonna walk up and ask to crawl into bed with me."

"Oh, come ON! That was . . . I was THREE!"

Dean shuddered. "And you were gross, let me tell you."

"You're not still holding that against me?"

"I had the flu for two WEEKS Sam! I think I threw up food from my last incarnation. I singlehandedly boosted Kleenex's sales figures that month. I have NIGHTMARES about that stuff."

"Get out of the car."

"Are you sure we have to do this? Can't we just leave this one alone?"

"Chickenshit." Sam punched his biceps. "Get out of the car or I'm telling Dad you chickened out for a snot monster."

"Crap." Dean groaned. "You suck."

Sam watched him get out and then leaned down and grinned. "At least I don't blow."

"Fuck off."

He chuckled and got out on his side, carefully locking the door before he slammed it. "Don't worry, bro. We'll wipe this one off the face of the earth."

"Euggh. Just . . ." Dean shook his head and punched a hole in a bag, pulling it over his head. "Damn. This is embarrassing. Can I at least shoot his ass?"

"No. He's an innocent human."

"With a snortergeist."

"Infested by a supernatural nasal spirit."

"Not even rock salt?"

Sam just looked at him. Dean edged towards the trunk of the car. "I'm not going in there unarmed."

"Did I ask you to?" He held up a bottle and a squirt gun.

"That is NOT armed." He popped the trunk, held up the shotgun. "THIS is armed.

"Which you will not use on innocent humans."

"Fine. Not on innocent humans." Dean nodded, smiling with a sweet, innocent expression that Sam knew was fake, having watched his brother practice it to perfection as a teenager.

"Or on guilty ones either," Sam amended.

"You're no fun." Dean snapped it open, checked, and flicked the barrel up in a showy close. He ducked out of sight and Sam knew he was scooping up a handful of rock salt shells. At least, he hoped that's all his brother was getting. He sighed and poked a hole in a bag, pulling it over his head.

When he poked his head through the hole he found Dean was standing next to him, watching the Metropolitan with the kind of expression he usually reserved for green beans and healthy food. He sucked in a deep breath, held it, puffed it out and shot a blatantly false smile to Sam. "Let's show this bitch how we do things downtown?"

Sam answered with a slightly more genuine smile. "After you."

"No, no, ladies first, I insist."

"Asshole."

"Geek."

"Jerk."

Dean smiled a wide, genuine smile and delivered the cherished insult with precision. "Bitch."

"Okay." Sam shouldered a satchel of salt canisters, holy, salty water, cookies, and maybe one or two handguns and knives and books. Tools of the trade. Except for the cookies.

Dean, for once, wasn't jostling to lead the way. Sam was just as happy to have him at his back as he carefully picked a path around standing puddles of slime on the painted concrete steps and into the lobby. It wasn't hard to see the trail to the elevator. Or the cloudy smudge of stuff on the up button. Dean still looked greenish. Sam pulled a pencil from a pocket of his satchel to push the button – he might not be squicked but he wasn't going to expose himself to the stuff if he could avoid it.

The brothers both edged to the walls, away from the fresh stains in the middle of the carpet, and tried to hold their breath through one-two-three-four-five-six-seven floors and out. Carefully. Avoiding the stuff on the worn linoleum floors of the hall. Sam tilted his head. "Sort of like bread crumbs."

"Slimy, snotty, disgusting, oozing breadcrumbs," noted Dean, nodding. "Easy to follow, I'll give it that."

"At least it's not some kind of revolting shed skin." Sam tried to inject a cheerful note as he edged down the hall.

"I liked the revolting skin better," whispered Dean.

"Oh come –" Whatever he was going to say was cut off by a crackling sound, then a high pitched scream and a loud SNAP and all the lights in the hall went dark. The dingy window at the end of the hall cast a dim light, enough to see by but not enough to make the scene anything but ominous. Sam looked over to find his brother, pale and wide-eyed, shotgun ready. "Dean?"

"Ready." He sounded grimly determined. "Let's toast this –"

This time it wasn't a crackling noise but the high pitched wail of a man in agony, a scream of grief and pain so profound it raised the hackles of both brothers. There was only one possible response – they launched into motion. And promptly skidded on slippery, slimy linoleum. Sam lurched into a door jamb and used the knob to keep upright, while Dean was frantically pin-wheeling and working to keep his feet. Natural athleticism and possibly superhuman disgust were all that kept him from landing flat on the floor as he slid several feet down the hall, leaving a gouged trail in slime that was apparently at least an inch or two thick.

"Are you okay?"

"I'm gonna have to burn these boots." Dean had reached the point where the slime trail petered out, and was standing braced against the relatively clean wall across from a smeared door, from under which slurped a slow current, and from behind which came the sound of wrenching, gurgling, muffled sobs. Sam blinked, looked over at Dean and shuddered at the sound. Softly, "what do you make of that?"

Dean raised an eyebrow, no longer pale now that the action had started. Shook his head. "Only one way to find out." He lifted one foot.

"Wait!" Sam held up a hand. "We could just knock?"

The look he got was eloquent.

"Try the doorknob?"

"I'm not touching that. That's a biohazard."

Sam sighed. "Kick it in."

"Thank you!"

The door was cheap, shattering away from the lock in a quick surrender, to rebound off the wall so fast it slammed back shut. Dean stared at it with an offended look. "Damn it!"

This time the door stayed open. The brothers peered in cautiously to find one forlorn figure draped, weeping, over the smoking, sparking carcass of a large screen TV. This time Dean took the lead, slithering carefully into the room on a pillow of unspeakable stuff. He moved around carefully to the left to get a better look, and Sam moved to right, dividing the target and covering the figure from the other side.

It was a man. A man in what had once been a fashionable, bright red nylon shirt, with a fashionable gang bandanna on his head, and fashionable drop-crotch pants that sagged to that perfectly calibrated point that just barely showed his crack. And all of it, man, clothes, dangling gold chains, furniture, floor, and most of all, the wide screen TV, all festooned in nasty green fluid. Sam was beginning to share Dean's dislike of snot.

The man looked up, wiping a hand under his nose uselessly to smear stuff across his dark skin. "Pleadzz," he gurgled. "pleadzzz helhp me."

Dean visibly swallowed. He was standing like he was trying not to touch the air molecules in the room, arms pulled in to make sure he didn't brush against anything even though he wasn't near anything. "You're not gonna fight?"

"Bitch killed my TV!" The stricken man ran a hand over the set like a bereaved owner soothing a dying pet. "I just got it. I was gonna watch the Miami game . . .and she killed it!"

Dean looked nervously around. "Where is she?"

"There!" The man pointed and the gesture sent a ropy strand flinging across Dean's black trash-bag armor, and that sent the hunter skittering back several feet to stand poised to flee.

Sam saw the whites of his eyes. "Dean?"

Dean swallowed sharply. "Okay. Okay. Just . . TELL us, okay? Don't move."

"But –" The slimy victim raised a hand.

"AH!" Dean raised a finger. "STOP! Right there. Not an inch. Sam? Do you see it?"

Sam was already searching, scooting carefully across sticky, wet floors to check the tables in the living room, no bookcases, dining room table, bad posters of well-endowed pop stars, ugly centerpiece, kitchen stocked with pizza boxes and Chinese food cartons and beer cans in the sink. Sam checked the dishwasher and, ahh, there she was. The white box was clearly safe and sound in one of the least used appliances in this place. Sam pulled it out of the machine and slid back safely to the living room. "Got it!"

"Okay, then . . ." Dean looked around. "Can we go now?"

And all hell broke loose.

The TV began to rock back and forth. Its bereft owner screamed and leaped back, arms flailing and snot whipping from his fingertips as his nose flowed like a dam had just burst and Dean screamed what had to be the closest thing to a girly scream he'd ever given in his life as he was splattered across the bag-clad chest. Sam heard beer cans rattle behind him and yelped, jumping for the relatively clean and projectile-free dining room.

It didn't help. The cheap light fixture was swinging from the ceiling and on the wall, the pop star poster's boobs were jiggling along with the rest of her. The poster glass cracked as a splatter of goo hit it and Sam squeaked and cringed back. He'd swear to the day he died that he was worried about shattering glass but the truth was, he just didn't want that STUFF touching him. He backed up with the box tucked under his arm and glanced into the living room where Dean was crouched behind a chair, hiding from splatters, looking for a target and stepping quickly to avoid little currents of ooze that were trying to trip him up.

Chairs in the dining room clattered against the table, which kept lifting from the floor and dropping with a crash, like an animal hopping up and down with nerves. The neighbors below must have tired of it because the sound of rapping on their ceiling added to the havoc. The box under Sam's arm was moving, almost squirming. Their victim was just sobbing and spinning in circles, clearly distraught and distributing his muck as widely and effectively as possible, and furniture in the living room had begun to move.

A low, glass table in the living room cracked and rattled. Sam noted absently that it was dusty. Very dusty, in a specific pattern of lines . . . smeared, greasy, dusty, lines. . He made a face then spun as a grinding noise startled him . . . just in time to be clotheslined by the dining room table. Quick reflexes saved him being forced into an intimate knowledge of the poster-pop-star's heaving bosom as he went limp and dropped, letting the table cruise over his head and trying not to think about what might be on the carpet under his back. The table hit the wall above his head and stood there, jouncing up and down. From the living room he heard Dean shout his name, knew his brother hadn't seen him drop to safety. He looked around and found himself, to his relief, on a dry, fairly clean spot of rug with the archway to the dining room to his right, and a wall at his back. Just out of sight of the living room and shielded from flung snot, couldn't get much better than that!

Unless you were Dean, of course. Sam peeked around the nice, safe corner of his refuge to see their host still wailing and flailing and splattering stripes of nasty green snot, and Dean looking distinctly queasy and worried at the same time, poking his head from behind a Lazy-boy and jerking back every time the splatter factor got too close.

"Sam? SAM?"

"I'm - LOOKOUT!"

Dean ducked and fluid missed him. Sam bit down on his lip to keep from laughing at the look on his face. And abruptly cringed as Dean popped up again for a quick surveillance of the field of battle, only to get hit across the face with a strand of the weapon of choice. Snot.

This time it wasn't a girly scream. It was a whimper of profound disgust. Dean probably would have howled except from what Sam saw, that might have let the stuff get in his mouth and no way was that gonna happen. It was kind of amazing really – a first in Sam's experience, though he granted he only had about ten years of hunting compared to his brother and dad, what with them not taking him along for years and then the four years at college. He studied the scene with the kind of attention he'd have used for, oh, say, dissecting a particularly revolting tape worm in a science class on invertebrate anatomy

It wasn't a very big apartment – the hall door opened the living room and the living room had an arch on one side, symbolically separating it from the dining room and then the kitchen. Sam hadn't looked at the bedroom, and he really was hoping he wouldn't have to. Right then he was looking at the chaos that a creative poltergeist could cause and admiring it in a revolted sort of way.

The apartment's owner – call him Snotty for convenience – was going to have to burn his stylish gang-color clothing if Sam was any judge of the after-effects of a serious haunting. Probably have to burn his furniture too, and his wide screen television had definitely gone to the Best Buy in the Sky. And his brother . . .

Well. Dean. Sam had to hunch back down around his corner to keep Dean from seeing as he started to laugh, trying to keep it quiet, even though Snotty was howling, the TV was still sparking, stuff was splattering, furniture was rattling on the floors, pictures were rattling on the walls, and cans, dead pizza boxes, dead pizza in the boxes, trash, shoes, glass ashtrays, and anything else that could make a noise if it hit something was hitting something and making noise. But Dean had the ears of a Peruvian fruit-bat and Sam was reasonably sure his lifespan would be seriously shortened if his brother knew he was hunched down trying not to get caught laughing like a hyena.

The last he'd seen of Dean, he'd been hunched behind a tacky beige Lazy-boy armchair, face twisted with ineffable disgust, trying to figure out how to wipe Snotty's . . . product off his face without touching himself. The problem was doubly knotty because he had splatters of the stuff on the plastic bag he was wearing over his clothes. He looked like a cat with tape on all four paws. Sam sincerely hoped he got it off his face and also sincerely hoped that it took him long enough that Sam could stop laughing by the time he did.

He must have figured it out because a moment later his voice was a harsh roar cutting through the two-year-old-in-a-kitchen-store racket of the apartment. "That's it! That is IT! You are gonna eat SALT, bitch!"

"Oh shit!" Sam stopped laughing and sat up fast.

Dean had come up like the hero of a terminator movie and pulled the trigger. It was pretty damn impressive. The rock salt rounds he used were loaded with enough sodium chloride to give high blood pressure to every man, woman, child and spook in range and he'd just fired one off into the enclosed space of Snotty's cheap living room.

Sam flinched back as salt pinged off of everything that would ping, and thudded off of everything else. "Was that really necessary?"

Snotty was screaming, anything that could move was moving, hula hoops of snot were flying, things were breaking, rattling, whining, and banging and even so, through all that, Dean heard him. "Damn straight it was necessary! That was disgusting!"

"Come on, man. Shotguns for a runny nose? You don't think that's overkill?"

"Not the first shot." Dean peeked out from around the side of the Lazy-boy where he'd ducked back down. He shot a maniacal grin at Sam. "But maybe THIS one . . ."

"Ohhh shit . . ." That was a mistake. Even as Dean aimed into the living room again, Sam realized that Essie had given him a pass on the first shot. She had to have because she was sure loaded for bear over the second. Dean let loose, the second shot shattered whatever glass had survived the first one and peppered Snotboy. Or maybe salted him would be a better term. God, Dean's sense of humor was rubbing off. Maybe it was the pun that did it, maybe the as-salt-ive manner, maybe just the bad attitude because there was absolutely no doubt about it. Essie was riled.

The first sign was the ominous rattling of the table over Sam's head. It shook and hopped and thumped up and down. What little glass was still clinging to the frames of various tacky posters shattered and blew out into the room. The footrest of the Lazy-boy snapped in and out like a tongue sticking out. Lightbulbs exploded overhead. The dusty leaves of silk plants shredded and tore. The nasty, nearly-empty beer cans ricocheted out of the kitchen, pinging and dripping stale beer all over as they pinballed around the apartment in aluminum mayhem. In the epicenter of it all, Snotty was crouched next to his ruined television and sobbing in big, gurgling gulps.

And Sam's big, bad brother Dean was aiming a shotgun into the middle of the maelstrom and shouting threats and taunt. Yep. Just another day on the job.

As a rule, Sam had found that ghosts were the unearthly remains of extremely pissed off individuals. They may or may not have had a big beef with life but they certainly did with death, or with something about their means of death. Essie, for example, had been denied her last request, to rest by the man she loved. It made her testy. It made her annoyed. Even more annoying had to be the experience of serving as ersatz nose candy for criminal youths, so she was understandably a bit put out as Dean blew another shell full of rock salt into her temper tantrum and yowled in primitive glee. Yep, if Dean had asked Sam, which he didn't, Sam would have told him he was asking for it. Begging for it. Any pre-law student would have told him in a heartbeat that a reasonable person would have said he could fully expect the outcome to be something other than peace, quiet and sunshiny joy.

So it really wasn't a surprise when the table over Sam's head overturned so the flat tabletop became a battering ram, and then took off like a maniacal bumper car on a mission from God. It slammed through the archway, knocking a hole in the plasterboard, and on out into the living room. Sam sat up and howled, "DEEEAN!" as the menacing particle-board and cheap veneer dining room table bore down on the senior hunter.

Dean had already seen it coming because even as Sam yelled, he was ducking behind the chair. Faux-wood-grain veneer met Naugahyde in a muffled crash and the chair was slammed violently back into the wall. Sam gasped in horror as the chair was driven viciously back, caving in the gypsum drywall and embedding the chair in the wall.

Sam launched himself out of his protected corner, ducking whizzing beer cans, slipping and sliding in slime, ignoring the splatters of stale beer and other substances that might splash him as the chaos went on unchecked. He vaulted the table edge, landing in the cradling seat of the Lazy-boy with a squeak of springs and a groan that he hoped was the chair. He couldn't even peer over the back – it was too deeply sunk into the wall. But a narrow triangular space still existed, where someone might seek shelter. Leaning down and peeking around into that wedge of space, Sam saw knees, and feet. And the ripped, ruptured back of the chair, where a head poked out slowly and green eyes screwed shut, blinked open wide, screwed shut again. Dean had chair stuffing in his hair and dust all over his face and a look of dumb consternation that was oddly reassuring. He licked his lips and screwed up his face at the taste of the dust. "Shit. What happened?"

Sam sighed in relief and huddled a little closer to the back of the chair, cringing as a beer can scored a direct hit on the back of his head. "Possessed furniture."

Dean was slowly extricating himself from the chair. It had to have been shoved so hard and fast that his body just punched right into the back of it. He winced and jerked an arm and Sam heard the sproing of a spring and the tearing of cloth. He reached back and tugged his shotgun out of the chair too, then looked up at Sam. Who had to laugh at the wistful, forlorn expression on his face. "What? Man, you look like you got a flat on the Impala."

Dean heaved a theatrical sigh loud enough to hear above the gurgling snotboy, pinging beer cans, and other assorted noises that the snortergeist made. "You got anything? Cause right now I'm ready to just leave this asshole to the ghost."

"You'd give UP?" Sam's voice squeaked with shock.

Dean wrinkled his nose and shuddered. "If the alternative is staying in this place long enough to figure out how to win? Damn straight."

"Dean . . ." Sam didn't get the chance to protest. Something hit the back of his head, slammed his face into the chair on which he knelt, and wrapped itself around his head. "SHIT! Get it off get it off!"

"What the fuck?" Sam heard Dean curse as both their hands collided and tangled, then Dean's hands fell away and Sam heard a snort of laughter. Then, "Hold still."

"I can't see!"

"No shit, Sherlock! You've got a pizza box on your head."

Oh. So that explained the smell. And what felt like fossilized pepperoni up his nose. "Get if offa me!"

He heard the muffled mayhem of the apartment but he also definitely heard Dean chortle. Chortle, goddamn it! "Are you laughing at me? You asshole!"

"Language, language . . .hold really still." Dean grunted audibly and the smooth, menacing silvery blade of his favorite (big), sharp (really big), well-used (fucking HUGE!) knife sliced through the cardboard and caressed the side of Sam's face.

"SHIT!"

"Told you to hold still. But say 'shit' again. You sound really funny, like Rudolph in that puppet movie. Say 'I'm cuuuude, Sam, say it!"

"Ahhzzhole." Damn it. Dean was right. He did sound like Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer with that fake nose. He sighed, and the knife slid through cardboard on the other side of his head, then Dean was folding down a flap in front of his face.

"Peekaboo!" Dean grinned. "You look like one of those stupid cats with the funnels on their heads."

"Like I said. Ahhzzhole."

Dean wrinkled his nose, ducking slightly as a beer can tried to wing him. "That stuff up your nose. I didn't know they made green pepperoni. Fuzzy green pepperoni."

"Oh god!" Sam tried to reach his nose and just hit the cardboard. He looked up for help and realized his brother was under attack. Dean had slid off the arm of the Lazy-boy and was fending off a concerted attack by a hostile torchiere. Sam paused in trying to extricate the fossilized pepperoni to watch his brother evade a vicious feint by the floor lamp, pull it into a rather creatively modified judo hold and use it to fend off a half-hearted assault by a rather sad looking end table.

"Hey!" Sam tried to tug the cardboard off his head again and finally ripped it loose, throwing it down. "You okay?"

Dean glanced up. The floor lamp exploited the opening and wrapped a cord around his ankles, sending him tumbling. "FUCK!"

Sam snickered, but his moment of amusement nearly undid him as the pizza box flapped threateningly again. He spun, planting one foot squarely on the smiling Italian chef on the box. "Stop that! I didn't do anything to you."

"crap crap crap crap!" Dean was cursing softly and trying to get the lamp cord unwrapped from his ankles, back arched so as little as possible of his body was touching the slimy, stale-beer-splattered, flotsam-strewn mess that had once been a profoundly cheap carpet. Sam shook his head in sympathy and warily edged past the pizza box to kick the end table over on its side before it could do . . . whatever it was that end tables did when they attacked big brothers on the floor. Dean pulled the lamp cord away from where it was trying to flail him to death with the plug. "Can you get this thing off me?"

"I have a traumatic history with lamp cords," Sam replied, looking around for the duffel he'd abandoned when he'd run to Dean's rescue. It was still huddled in the dining room. Sam took a deep breath, wrinkling his nose at the lingering green pepperoni scent left even after he'd extracted the processed meat remnants. He heaved a sigh, reaching down to yank the cord off Dean. "You know Dean, I've just about had enough of this mess."

Dean sat up, looking disgustedly at the slime on his shirt and pants. "Yeah. I'm thinking I'm gonna burn everything I'm wearing. And maybe get some Lysol instead of soap."

"You about ready to toast this bitch?" Sam sidestepped a cartwheeling silk plant and hauled Dean up onto his feet.

"You even need to ask?" Green eyes shot him a speculative look. "Got any ideas? Cause right now I'm coming up blank. Can't light the bitch up without frying the junky –"

That comment brought a shrill, panicky scream. Sam and Dean both jumped, startled, and looked over to where the apartment's owner was gibbering on the floor. "No! NO! You can't do that to me please! NO NO NO!"

"Will you shut UP?" Dean snarled. "I'm gonna leave your ass in this mess if you don't shut it!"

"Pleeeease –" he started. And then thankfully the ghost must have gotten fed up too, because an old carton of dessicated fried rice dropped on Snotty's head like a fez, and what might once have been an eggroll planted itself firmly in his open, howling maw. Dean broke into a sunny, bright smile and turned, beaming, to Sam. "Damn. I just about take back all the shit I said about Essie. She's not so bad."

Sam batted another carton away before it could nail Dean and nodded. "She doesn't deserve to be trapped here."

"You got something college boy?"

"Maybe." Sam glanced back to the dining room. "I need my stuff. Cover me."

"Cov-" Dean broke off as Sam took off. He could hear his brother cursing, but staying right by his side. From the corner of his eye Sam saw faux vegetation, ancient food containers and other small projectiles batted away, heard the few thuds as Dean didn't manage to defend himself as well and then he had it, the green, ripstop nylon bag was in his hands and he was digging through it, finding . . .

"Salt!" Dean caught the carton Sam tossed to him. "But what do we put it around? She's got no body!"

"Him!" Sam pointed.

"Sam," Dean looked to the junky and back. "Man, it's a nice thought but you and I both know her ashes are all OVER this place. Every time that asshole sneezed he . . . well." He gestured. "Poor old bitch is all over him, his table, his carpet, and that's if he DIDN'T share the score."

Sam glared at him. "I have an idea. Trust me."

"Right," breathed Dean. "Heard that one before." But he was making his way across the room, towards the cringing, slimy, gibbering, messy, food-strewn wreck of a man who huddled by the ruin of his television set, spitting out stale eggroll bits.

"Donnn' hurd me!"

"Will you shut UP?"

"Buddt –"

"Damn. Essie, could use another eggroll here . .. "

Sam almost looked up at that, but he was busy digging through the bag. "Ahhh, got it!"

"What?" Dean looked up from where he was pouring a circle around the junky.

"These!" Sam held up a carton.

Dean stopped, circle three quarters poured. "Cookies?"

"Chocolate chip cookies!"

"Man, those are Chips Ahoy. What the fuck are you gonna do with those?"

Sam frowned. "Don't be such a cynic. They're cookies. Symbols of youthful pleasure and family times."

Dean planted his hands on his hips. "They're mass-produced artificial crap. And I ought to know. I ate enough of the things."

"Look. They were what the corner store had."

"You couldn't find a Mrs. Fields?"

"Just . . . rrrgh." Sam stomped over to him and snatched away the salt, bringing the circle to almost closed. He looked up, called, "Essie! ESSIE!"

The wind in the small room whipped faster. If the salt hadn't been anchored by snot it would have been blown away. Dean raised his hands to protect his head and swore. Sam squinted against the dust storm of crap in the air. "Cookies, Essie!"

"Idiot," muttered Dean. "She's got her pride, man! She's not gonna go for those hockey pucks you got!"

"If you have a better idea then bring it on!" Sam hunched up and scowled at him.

"Give me the cookies," his brother snarled, snatching them out of his hands. "Hey Essie! Look at this shit! This is what they're calling cookies these days, you gonna let 'em get away with that crap?"

The shrieking wind picked up louder and louder, a dust devil, a small tornado spinning madly around the three men and their cookies, whipping dust, dirt, debris and snot in a revolting maelstrom through the air.

"LOOK ESSIE!" screamed Dean. "HERE THEY ARE!" And he ripped the package and spilled the little disks out into the circle, reaching and yanking the junky out just as the wind converged in a tall, amorphous shape in the circle of salt. Sam knew his cue and poured out the rest of the salt, completing the ring.

The room went silent between one beat of the their hearts and the next. In an instant, the screaming wind was gone and the only sound was the panting of two men and the adenoidal gurgle of the third. Then their granny-sniffing host made a shocked noise and dragged the sleeve of his brightly colored, filthy jacket across his nose. "Oh Christ, I can BREATHE! I CAN BREATHE!" He shouted in a clear, uncongested voice. He spun in a circle and then threw himself, bright-eyed, at Dean to hug him.

The hunter yelped and backed up, catching himself just before he could scuff the salt. Trapped, he was seized in a gummy hug. Sam grinned and sidled away as Dean whimpered in revulsion and visibly paled. The snotty sufferer spun, grinning at Sam. "Y'all did it! My noise ain't running!"

"Good, good," Sam patted the air. "Just . . . there's stuff few have to do, dude. Secret stuff. You better clear out or you might . . ." He gestured at his nose. Snot-boy's eyes went wide, whites showing all around, and he nodded. "Later. I got a date with a YMCA shower. Let yourselves out, man. And . . . . thank you."

"Right. Right." Dean was nodding, teeth visibly clenched. "Bye. Later. Been fun. Don't do it again."

Sam turned back to the cloudy column of air in the circle of salt. He took a deep breath and slumped a little. "Huh. Now what."

"You're the brains of this show. I'm just here for muscle and beauty."

Sam eyed his bedraggled brother. "You keep telling yourself that."

"Sure. So now you have to come up with something brilliant." Dean grinned widely.

"Hoo." Sam turned back to the circle of salt. "Maybe we can, I dunno . . . burn her?"

"Like I said. She's all over the apartment and probably still up that guy's nose."

"Uhhh," Sam blinked. Tilted his head one way. Tilted it the other. "So. Ghost. Black and white thinker. Physical anchor. Anchor was her ashes."

"Still is. Along with cookies." Dean nodded, watching him with a singularly unhelpful smirk on his face.

"Burning cookies won't do any good." Sam winced as he realized how dumb that had sounded.

Dean nodded like he was considering it. "Burning cookies. Gonna remember that one, Genius."

"Can't let her out of the circle."

"Wouldn't recommend it."

"Exorcism?"

"She's not a demon, Sam, she's just a little old lady who's pissed off about being snorted." Dean started to run his hand through his hair, took a look at his hand and stopped. "You about played out."

"There's only a few ways to DEAL with a ghost, Dean!" Sam waved a hand, then paused as his big, big brain came through for him. Again. Fixed his brother with a look and said, "But I've been away from the family business you know. This is really YOUR specialty, big brother. I know YOU must have seen something like this before."

"Are you passing the goddamn buck, you smarmy little shit?"

Sam grinned. "Yep!"

"You so suck." Dean crossed his arms over his chest and scowled. Narrowed his eyes. Glared at the column and said, "Essie. Do you hear me?"

A cookie flew from the circle to ping off his forehead. Dean winced. "Okay. That answers that. Essie, are you LISTENING to me?" Another cookie, but lobbed more gently this time.

Dean grinned widely. "Essie, I'm gonna offer you a deal. Okay? And if you agree you'll . . . uhh . . right. Toss a cookie to me. Do you agree? One cookie for yes, two for no."

"One cookie –" Sam stared at him, shaking his head in bemusement.

"Working here, and you didn't come up with anything better, smart boy."

"Okay, okay, shutting up now."

"Good." Dean turned back to the column of cloudy air and floating baked goods, and gave it his most charming, most convincing expression.

What happened next was unheard of. By the time he was done, Sam gave up all hope of being entered into the annals of hunter lore because he knew for sure that no hunter would believe him. Not a word, not a syllable. But it happened.

When they walked out of that apartment and hour later, the place was a shambles but it was clean.

No snot stained the rug, no slime marred Dean's handsome face or beat up jeans.

Only the wreckage of tossed trash and shorted out electronics remained to testify to the snortergeist's presence.

That a note, warning the man who was only known as Snotty that he was bound, by forces natural and not, and no more would he snort drugs, no more would he steal, no more would he break the law, on fear of eternal nasal agony and snot forevermore.

All proceeds from drugs would go to buy school lunches. And if he broke the rules, snorted or stole, then Essie would know. Dean had left a cartoon of a nose, dripping, on the bottom of the page to make sure the threat was clear.

And the two clean hunters, bearing only the bruises of beer cans and a box half-full of cremains, let themselves out and shut the door behind them, and left, at the closest thing to a dead run they could manage while still pretending to walk.

5) Final Dead-ication

The setting sun glowed softly through wispy clouds as Dean and Sam Winchester surreptitiously filled back in the hole they'd dug in the ground. They planted a small flowering bush beside the plain granite stone that bore Fergus Sullivan's name, and the inscription, "Beloved of Essie, and well fed by her." Dean smiled kindly and patted the dirt at the base of the shrub. "The cookie jar was a nice touch, Sam. Good thinking."

"Hey, I owed her one."

Dean made a rude noise, but shot him a questioning look. Sam grinned and held up his phone. His phone with the camera. With the picture of one Dean Winchester, cradling a big, yellow, Winnie the Pooh. Dean's eyes widened. "You did not."

"By now Missouri's put it on the web."

"CRAP!"

The setting sun glowed softly as two men ran, one for his life and one for his image. Both of them laughing. And behind them lay a humble grave, flowers, a stone, and the smell of cookies baking in the air.

Pesky Author's note:

The stolen ashes are real. Research on this one is worth the time – wonderful water cooler rumors abound!

And my apologies to Valjean for borrowing her Peruvian fruit bat line, but it was too good to resist.


End file.
